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Another round of cutbacks has taken place at the circulation-challenged Daily News.
The latest round of cuts, which were spread out over two weeks ended last Friday, were concentrated on the advertising and back shop business side of operations.
As many as 22 people were cut, one source said of the latest purge.
The belt-tightening follows the unsuccessful effort by Daily News owner Mort Zuckerman to sell the teetering tabloid last year.
That effort ended with all three serious suitors failing to submit bids for the paper, which was said to be losing $30 million a year. It was then pulled from the market.
Management then went out and sought a range of cost-cutting moves — some say in hopes of prettying up the sagging paper for a second go-round on the block.
Cost-cutting moves included:
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Massive cuts to the newsroom, particularly the sports section. Sports editor Terri Thompson was canned and her replacement, Bill Price quit shortly thereafter to join the NHL publications department.
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Longtime columnists, including Denis Hamill and Juan Gonzalez left the paper. Mike Lupica had his nearly $1 million-a-year contract trimmed to the $250,000 range and managed to hang on.
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Editor-in-chief Colin Myler, only weeks after sources said he finished a redesign of his office space in the News downtown HQ, was sent packing.
Just add water!
Swedish police officer Mikaela Kellner took down a pickpocket while she was sunbathing in a starry bikini with a group of her pals.
“I just acted on instinct and didn’t think about it so much until after we had him pinned down,” Kellner told The Local. “When I sat there and looked at our other two friends who are not police officers and realized that it probably looked pretty funny. But I would have stepped in no matter my outfit.”
Kellner, who was off-duty at the time, was catching some sun with friends earlier this week in a Stockholm park when a man pretending to sell magazines to benefit the homeless approached them. They politely declined his offers, but the man continued to linger.